Free In this Night We Own (The Commander Book 6) by Randall Farmer Page B

as a sort-of enslaved Focus,” Gail said.  “There we were, fresh out of the clinic, and…”
     
    ---
     
    It was midnight before Tonya hung up the phone.  When she did, she leaned back in her chair and rubbed her temples.  Gail was so deep in the hole she couldn’t even see the surface any more.  She was so ignorant she didn’t even know how deep she was, even with her list of problems.  Nor did she know the worst of her problems.  Pissing off Wini Adkins was her worst problem, and if true, she would need to mortgage her soul to buy herself clear.  A Focus like that should never have someone like Wini as a mentor.
    “Delia,” she said. “Delia, I need you to send out a letter for me.”
    Delia came in from the room across the hall, and Tonya handed Gail Rickenbach’s file to her.
    “Copy this, and then send the original to Gail Rickenbach.  Make sure you take out everything but the first page.  It needs to go out in the morning’s mail.”
    “Yes, ma’am.  I’ll get it,” Delia said, but she didn’t leave.
    “What is it?” Tonya asked.
    “Are you done for the night, ma’am?” Delia asked. “You should rest.”
    “Maybe in a bit,” Tonya said.  There were still a hundred things to do.
    Delia’s eyes were sad and wise. “You’re tired,” she said, “and worn out.  Take a rest.  It can wait ‘til tomorrow.”
    Worn out.  That was a euphemism, and Tonya checked the juice counts of the household around her.
    “Oh, no.  I’m sorry Delia,” she said as she fixed the juice flow.  The juice wasn’t off by more than a little, but Tonya didn’t like to slip even that minor amount.  Maybe she was more worn than she knew.  “Just give me a few more minutes and I’ll be done.  Go to bed yourself.  I’ve kept you up far too late.”
    “Yes, ma’am.” Delia smiled.
    Tonya shook her head sadly as Delia left, and thought of the youthfully talented Gail Rickenbach and the other two screwed up Focuses that she had discovered.  She hadn’t expected it to be this bad.  Now she only hoped not to find too many more.
     
    Gilgamesh: August 22, 1968 – August 24, 1968
    “What was that?” Carol said, slipping a little Tiamat into her voice as she sat up.  Gilgamesh fully woke after a fitful hour of sleep, tired, worn and sated.  Distant breakfast smells wafted through the air conditioning ducts and the windows of Carol’s oversized bedroom showed the light of the early morning sun.
    He hadn’t had to ask, just think the thoughts, to get Carol to slip in a little Tiamat into their lovemaking.  The edge of fear, in bed, turned him on.  The power of an Arm being an Arm was his dirty secret, his fetish, the dangerous edge that had held him to Tiamat in St. Louis, Philadelphia and Chicago long before they had ever even spoken.
    The sex was as good as he hoped it would be.  He still tried to think what he could give Carol in return, what would be safe and what might turn out to be a stupid Crow-dross trick to play on a lover.  Crow sex tricks didn’t make it into any of the Crow letters.
    “Uh,” Gilgamesh said, excavating himself from the soft blankets.  He thought, trying to get a handle on Carol’s emotions.  Worried, edgy, befuddled, and a bit angry.  She thought he might have tried something.  “I was having one of those dreams,” he said.  “Earthquakes, storms, game board pieces, snippets of flower gardens, lab equipment, and snow covered pine trees.  Nothing made sense, but I do suspect someone was trying to tell me something.”  No matter what he tried, in any of his meditation modes or in his preparations for sleep, he couldn’t get the pheromone flow, as many other Crows named it, to be anything other than a chaotic mess.  “Ah,” he said.  “Perhaps the information was in what was lacking.  I’ve never had such a strong dream that didn’t include Beasts.”  What did that mean?
    “Dreaming.  Right,” Carol said, flopping back down on the bed in